Local News

Level III fire restrictions remain in place in San Miguel County. Under the restrictions, campfires, white gas stoves, open fires, controlled burning, charcoal grills and fireworks are prohibited. All Terrain vehicles without spark arresters and motorcycles and vehicles with catalytic converters are restricted to maintained roadways. Anyone found violating the restrictions could be fined up to $1,000.

The Santa Fe National Forest is implementing fire restrictions, according to The Associated Press. The restrictions will not apply to the Chama River Canyon Wilderness, Dome Wilderness, Pecos Wilderness and San Pedro Parks Wilderness. Campfires will be limited to designated camp and picnic grounds with grills and fire rings. Smoking will be permitted only in vehicles or buildings or in developed recreation sites. Federally managed lands in the adjacent Manzano and Gallinas mountains are closed due to fire danger.

ALBUQUERQUE — Conservation groups want wildlife officials to ban all recreational and commercial trapping on public lands in New Mexico.

The request was made this week despite a recent recommendation that game commissioners reconsider a temporary trapping ban in place in southwestern New Mexico where Mexican gray wolves have been reintroduced. The suggestion came from a small business task force appointed by Gov. Susana Martinez.

“That’s a lot of baloney.” Yes, we do have some strange sayings in our English language dichos, don’t we? I heard a friend say that very phrase recently, and true to form, I do know what a lot of baloney is, in another context.

Two city of Las Vegas utilities department employees were killed Wednesday morning when the ditch they were working in collapsed on them, City Attorney David Romero confirmed.
Gene Hern and Frank Romero died at the scene.
"We are still in shock and trying to address the needs of all concerned, including family members and coworkers," Romero said. "The primary concern now is for the families of the deceased."
He said Hern and Romero were working on a sewer line near Cinder Road and Palo Verde when the accident occurred.

A divided Las Vegas City Schools Board voted to not hire any of the four finalists for the superintendent post.

Board member Ricky Serna made the motion, explaining that he was looking for someone who could take the district from where it is to a model for education reform. He said that based on the interviews, he did not think any of the remaining finalists could do that.

A handful of West Las Vegas Schools district employees will soon be looking for a job, according to superintendent Ruben Cordova.

Cordova said budget problems are keeping the district from rehiring some first- and second- year employees. Those employees do not have tenure.

The district, meanwhile, is taking steps to ensure it can lay off tenured teachers, should budget problems require that at a future date. Districts officials stressed that there are currently no plans to lay off tenured teachers.

The state Supreme Court on Monday suspended a judge who was indicted on bribery charges in what the governor and a prosecutor said is just the beginning of the latest investigation into pay-to-play allegations against former Gov. Bill Richardson’s administration.

The court issued an order Monday that suspends state District Judge Michael Murphy immediately without pay. The suspension remains in effect until further action by the court.

The 11-page supplemental report chronicling the investigation of Judge Michael Murphy states that a Las Vegas judge urged a colleague to think carefully about turning Murphy in, warning that she could damage her career by doing so.

Judge Lisa Schultz told authorities that as she was grappling with how to proceed with Murphy’s request for payments to a Gov. Bill Richardson insider, she contacted Supreme Court Justice Petra Maes in 2009 and asked for advice. Maes reportedly told her that they could discuss the matter at the Judicial Conclave in Albuquerque.